By Michael Wynne
One of the great misbeliefs in preservation is that you have to have specific training to be a good historical preservationist. It is true though that skill, focused education and training does help in any field to be both more proficient and professional. But compassion, interest and dedication also go a long way towards success in preserving any history, albeit of our own or of our community, organization or country.
In my half century, I have met and admired all sorts of great historical preservationists, from nationally-known figures all the way to good local folks with no specific training in this field. What connects them all is simply wanting to save our shared history from destruction. We all want that, but we often fear that we need some sort of training or someone just to tell us what to do. Well, I will now tell you now of someone who has no training or prior knowledge on historical preservation and just might be one of the greatest preservationists that his state has to offer.
Charles “Charlie” Brown of Jonesboro in Jackson Parish, located half way between Winnfield and Ruston in north Louisiana, is one truly amazing man, I feel almost legendary, but he is still chugging along non-stop. I stopped one day at his curious informal antique shop, “Simply Vintage,” on U.S. Hwy 167 in Jonesboro. His shop now fills what was once a nursing home. It is the type of place you just might find anything, from Civil War uniforms to Matchbox cars, if you dig long enough. But what is important here about Charlie is not his antiques, but his historical reservation.
The son of a timber cutter, a man just short of receiving his high school diploma, Charles “Charlie” Brown, in my humble opinion, is the savior of Jackson Parish’s history, and to a slightly lesser extent, our own state’s great history. “I’ve always liked history,” Charlie told me in his comfortable office, “I like seeing history and bringing it back from possible complete destruction.”
Charlie has worked all of his life doing everything the hard way, starting by having his own “filling station” at age 15, then construction work, a garage and wrecker business, an auto salvage yard, a convenience store, a restaurant and finally a trucking company. But history, particularly his local history, was always on the back of his mind. His personal favorite history is the period of the 60’s, in particular, the music, but “I like a little bit of everything of those years as they were the good years.”
A self-made man, he became concerned when he saw the potential destruction of the parishes’ total newspaper archives of The Jackson Independent. “I just could not think about all of our history being wasted and just thrown away. It would all have been ruined (in the collapse of the newspaper office) if I had not saved it.”
In a special room in his shop that is devoted to the preservation of Jackson Parish’s history, he has collected every surviving edition of the parish’s newspaper as well as the paper’s original archives, all carefully preserved for the future. He is cataloging his large archives now. But Charlie did not stop with just the parishes’ newspaper. He goes to the old stores and homes and tries to save everyone’s historical memorabilia there, even if the people don’t care if it gets saved. Charlie knows preserving their history is important, even if no one else cares for now.
Among his collected treasures are irreplaceable pictures of Governor Jimmie Davis, a native of Jackson Parish, as well as Governor Edwin Edwards, both casual friends of Charlie. But Charlie has a rapidly growing assortment of new friends and admirers for what he is now accomplishing on his own.
The next time that you drive through Jonesboro, stop and see a great, but odd assortment of irreplaceable historic treasures, as well as meet a man who is saving our state’s history, one item at time.
